vivdunstan: Part of own photo taken in local university botanic gardens. Tree trunks rise atmospherically, throwing shadows from the sun on the ground. (0)
vivdunstan ([personal profile] vivdunstan) wrote 2023-11-14 11:15 am (UTC)

This is vastly better written than some others from the period and earlier I'm trying to read. It's in (mostly) "Secretary Hand", and is nice and clear once you adjust the colours. But yes, transcription software isn't trained on this. I did have fun experimenting with Transkribus (https://transkribus.ai) on 18th century and 19th century text. Unsurprisingly the latter worked better! Though I know some Jacobite scholars who have been using it with some success on mid and late 18th century documents.

Handwriting styles can be learned, but even that isn't enough if the document is in a horrendous state. Here's a 1656 document concerning the uncle of the 1648 will man. And the bleed through is horrific. Yes this is the front side of it.


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